Increase your influence with half the effort

» Part one of a two-part series

READ this only if you are serious about making success as easy as possible!

How many courses have you taken that were supposed to improve your communication skills? And how does that compare to the number of hours you have invested in learning the technical aspects of your industry? Do the numbers even come close? If you are like most busy people, the answer is "NO."

You know how important dynamic communication skills are to your overall success; however, developing this area always seems to take a back seat to the urgent, repetitive tasks of business and life. And, we still wonder why relationships are difficult to build! Perhaps this gives us a hint why committees and teams are difficult to manage. It also illustrates why increased sales can sometimes be hard to secure.

Whether it is a personal, business, or sales relationship, there are so many facets of communication to think about in order to ensure a good working relationship that it can seem overwhelming. To make the matter even more complicated, there are those unspoken rules about things you must never do for one person that, at the same time, you must always do for another -- based on their preferences.

Treat each person differently to get outstanding results. If you do NOT treat each person differently, the following results are likely to occur:

» People may not like you as much as they could.
» People will not trust you if they don't like you.
» If people don't trust you, you will lose the sale.

We hear so much about "fairness" and "equality," yet communicating "the same way with everyone" is the farthest thing from the right thing to do. We think we should treat other people the way we want to be treated. Not so.

We need to go a step beyond that in order to discover how other people want to be treated, and then do exactly that. This may be the opposite of how you would want to be treated. But, because it is the best way to interact with them, you must adhere to "their rules" -- not your own. Think of this principle as the Platinum Rule.

Coach's insight

Since we tend to think about communicating according to our own rules, we expect other people to be just like us. We think the same thing that motivates us is the same thing that motivates others. Not true. Each of us has different motivational needs.

Some people want to be left alone in order to complete a task and get maximum results. Others prefer working in a team. Some people want to be given independence and control over projects of which they are in charge. Others want more clarity or specific direction in order to get optimal results. It is up to you as a business leader to uncover the motivational style in others.

How will you treat your team members differently this week to get results?